So today one of my friends wrote my name on the sheet of people who have to do sermonizing-and-what-not on Fridays. I know that if I erase it, she'll just write it back again.
Curses!
In other news, I am still obsessed with exorcisms. Also, I learned a new card game, which I lost but had fun playing.
Tomorrow I'm going to have breakfast with my uncle and meet his new gf: I'm excited!
Also, I am noticing the fact that my ability to comprehend and synthesize complex ideas is still sub-par, thanks to a series of medical interventions. This will make my saying anything remotely worthwhile unlikely. That includes this blog, which also serves as excellent proof that the Internet allows anyone to publish anything. Thus, not particularly looking forward to Friday.
Curses.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
To See One's Shadow
Today I was going to go to an Anglo-Catholic church to celebrate Candlemass – the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple. I’ve never actually observed it before, so I was exited. From what I overheard yesterday, it actually involves candles! I love candles from church services: I like to take them home and use them to light other candles.
Anyway, what happened instead is that I started going there after evening prayer and then realized that I actually wasn’t feeling very well and that it was cold. I really wasn’t looking forward to walking back alone in the dark. So I took the train home instead.
Since I don’t know anything about the celebration, I’ll do what I always do when I don’t know what I’m talking about: talk LOUDER. Just kidding, I mean I’ll talk about Mary. After all, it’s the Purification of Mary as well.
I have to confess, I find the notion that a woman is ‘unclean’ after childbirth distasteful. Ergo, I like to re-imagine what this ceremony means, even though my meanderings are basically groundless.
I imagine that, somehow, formally thanking God for your child and praising Him in an established ritual completes the process of giving birth to a child. That giving birth is as much a ritual as it is a physical process. That it’s a sacramental, like chrism or folding your hands reverently in prayer. Something inward, accomplished by and joined to an outward sign.
I think I read once that what happens with firstborn boys is that they actually belong to God, and that you sacrifice at the temple in order to buy them back or something. So Jesus belongs to Mary (and Joseph), not to God. Maybe that’s how she makes him turn the water into wine?
But enough of this. Today marks another holiday as well, one that seems to have far more bearing on our immediate lives. I mean, of course, Groundhog Day. All three groundhogs I know about saw their shadows today, so we’re in for a cold spell. Curses!
C. G. Jung understood the Shadow to be an archetype, a universal psychological construct containing all the things about ourselves that we try to repress (it’s something like the Freudian unconscious, composed of basic drives and desires). Our opposites, if you will. We tend to think of the Shadow as a negative splitting off (violence, hatred, etc.), what has been expelled from the Self. However, I think it’s more nuanced than that, more blurry, more individualized. The archetype is like a standard coat hanger that everyone has, upon which we place our individual and varied jackets. Even when we all have the same coat, they're all in slightly different shades. Maybe there’s someone out there who’s completely repressed their shyness. Whoever that it, is ain’t me.
Like all Jungian archetypes, the Shadow is part of a complex in which one part is dominant (for example: the Anima and Animus, male and female, also known as Soul). Total dominance is unhealthy: what’s necessary is the proper balance and integration. Professor Zuroff from the Psychology department says that the reason Luke Skywalker is so bland is that he’s over-repressing his shadow; Han Solo, who’s more vibrant, is doing it right.
Trying not to see your shadow, to block it out or cover it up with searing bright light, only makes you blind and unable to function (like Captain Kirk in that episode where the transporter splits him in half and neither the totally good Kirk nor the totally evil one can do anything useful).
We, like the groundhogs, are naturally scared of our Shadow, because we find it to be troubling, wild, threatening, unknown and uncontrollable. But being totally terrified by it isn’t useful either: then you just run away in fear back to ‘safety,’ freezing everything, pushing back the spring and the possibility of new life, leaving everything brittle and fragile and trapped beneath the perfect ice. I sometimes worry that’s what we’ve done to Mary: purified her.
What we need to understand about her is what we need in our own lives: to integrate the various aspects of ourselves and become the Self, the whole person in relationship with God, the Self as an intermeshing with both one's full humanity and the Divine, like perichoresis in the Trinity, around and in and through, together.
I think we’re not so much to be perfect as to realize that we are ransomed as Jesus was ransomed, free to return to God on our own, travelling through both the shadow and the light.
Anyway, what happened instead is that I started going there after evening prayer and then realized that I actually wasn’t feeling very well and that it was cold. I really wasn’t looking forward to walking back alone in the dark. So I took the train home instead.
Since I don’t know anything about the celebration, I’ll do what I always do when I don’t know what I’m talking about: talk LOUDER. Just kidding, I mean I’ll talk about Mary. After all, it’s the Purification of Mary as well.
I have to confess, I find the notion that a woman is ‘unclean’ after childbirth distasteful. Ergo, I like to re-imagine what this ceremony means, even though my meanderings are basically groundless.
I imagine that, somehow, formally thanking God for your child and praising Him in an established ritual completes the process of giving birth to a child. That giving birth is as much a ritual as it is a physical process. That it’s a sacramental, like chrism or folding your hands reverently in prayer. Something inward, accomplished by and joined to an outward sign.
I think I read once that what happens with firstborn boys is that they actually belong to God, and that you sacrifice at the temple in order to buy them back or something. So Jesus belongs to Mary (and Joseph), not to God. Maybe that’s how she makes him turn the water into wine?
But enough of this. Today marks another holiday as well, one that seems to have far more bearing on our immediate lives. I mean, of course, Groundhog Day. All three groundhogs I know about saw their shadows today, so we’re in for a cold spell. Curses!
C. G. Jung understood the Shadow to be an archetype, a universal psychological construct containing all the things about ourselves that we try to repress (it’s something like the Freudian unconscious, composed of basic drives and desires). Our opposites, if you will. We tend to think of the Shadow as a negative splitting off (violence, hatred, etc.), what has been expelled from the Self. However, I think it’s more nuanced than that, more blurry, more individualized. The archetype is like a standard coat hanger that everyone has, upon which we place our individual and varied jackets. Even when we all have the same coat, they're all in slightly different shades. Maybe there’s someone out there who’s completely repressed their shyness. Whoever that it, is ain’t me.
Like all Jungian archetypes, the Shadow is part of a complex in which one part is dominant (for example: the Anima and Animus, male and female, also known as Soul). Total dominance is unhealthy: what’s necessary is the proper balance and integration. Professor Zuroff from the Psychology department says that the reason Luke Skywalker is so bland is that he’s over-repressing his shadow; Han Solo, who’s more vibrant, is doing it right.
Trying not to see your shadow, to block it out or cover it up with searing bright light, only makes you blind and unable to function (like Captain Kirk in that episode where the transporter splits him in half and neither the totally good Kirk nor the totally evil one can do anything useful).
We, like the groundhogs, are naturally scared of our Shadow, because we find it to be troubling, wild, threatening, unknown and uncontrollable. But being totally terrified by it isn’t useful either: then you just run away in fear back to ‘safety,’ freezing everything, pushing back the spring and the possibility of new life, leaving everything brittle and fragile and trapped beneath the perfect ice. I sometimes worry that’s what we’ve done to Mary: purified her.
What we need to understand about her is what we need in our own lives: to integrate the various aspects of ourselves and become the Self, the whole person in relationship with God, the Self as an intermeshing with both one's full humanity and the Divine, like perichoresis in the Trinity, around and in and through, together.
I think we’re not so much to be perfect as to realize that we are ransomed as Jesus was ransomed, free to return to God on our own, travelling through both the shadow and the light.
Monday, February 1, 2010
You Said It, You Weirdo (or, the year in review)
Based on my calculations, I started this blog one year ago. In keeping with the annual-vestry-meeting theme going on at my church, I’ve decided to reflect on the past year. (Question: what is a vestry? It sounds like a place for the priest to get dressed. In which case, is the name of the meeting a metaphor for catching the priest half out of his robes and crowding in on him while he’s still partway between worlds – Mass and Coffee Hour?) [please excuse my gendered language]
In honor of my theme, I went back and read the first entry I posted. Wow, is it weird! I’ve never really read it before. I know that sounds bizarre, but when I wrote it it was more like something was pouring through me than like I was creating something…If only I could blame alcohol! Ah well, you live and learn.
In many ways, this blog testifies to the fact that I’ve accomplished almost nothing of substance. I still feel adrift. I still feel like I need to learn more about this place I’m drifting to, and I still don’t know how. I still feel as though I’m caught partway between worlds, in some ways crowded about by observers and commentators while I’m not quite ready to know where I stand.
It’s been a difficult year, personally, though no darkness is completely without light. I still have great difficulty getting the words ‘please help me’ out of my mouth, which is ironic since I can be somewhat aggressive in my helping of people. I guess I have to ask myself whether I really want to be helped by someone, or whether what I really want is to be alone in it, because I’m comfortable here. Sometimes I am afraid that if I really allow myself the self-indulgence of asking someone to understand and be supporting, I’ll end up in the pieces of myself that I’ve tried so hard to hold together.
Oh well, there’s always next year.
The ‘cards’ give me cryptic advice, as I read them. In my family, I need to look carefully within people and learn to see what is good and beautiful about them (I have someone particular in mind, but that’s neither here nor there). I also need to discover my own emotions so I can connect better with people, and maybe learn to see the good in that as well. I guess you could say I should try to be more optimistic and have a sunny disposition, generally making me a happier and more playful person, basically like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy.
Thinking of money and stuff, I have to think carefully and always doubt, keeping in mind the idea that I may have made mistakes. I’m pretty sure that has nothing to do with my investments, which are pretty darn secure. What I think this is about is more like not letting the things I’ve done or decided to do before dictate my way forward simply by momentum (I have a certain warm-and-fuzzy obsession in mind here, but that’s neither here nor there). Thinking carefully and acting with more common sense is important so I don’t piss other people off. I think I need to be careful in my relationships with others and not get swept away, kind of like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy.
I also need to be careful that the things I have don’t end up bogging me down so that I’m trapped in them (again, the obsession). I need to take some initiative in terms of getting out of that. Two messages on the same thing: that’s a pretty clear sign. I do need to have some more ambition in other areas, so that I can accomplish what other people want for my life, on my behalf (I’m thinking that I need to finish my thesis, but that’s neither here nor there).
My dealings with the world and the things in it need to be more generous. Um. Maybe I’m spending too much time praying, to the neglect of everything else? But I like prayer…right now I’m quite fond of the Office of Readings. Alternately, maybe I just need to learn to cut people a little more slack (I’m thinking of someone specific, but that’s neither here nor there). Also, maybe be a little less judgmental in my dealings with church and whatnot, kind of like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy. This kind of shift should make me a better person. I think I need to work on all the ways I’m lacking.
If there is a theme, it’s that I need to return to a time when I was more fully myself, before I went so spectacularly crazy. (I went crazy after college, so it's been a while. I think in a way I like it here.) Although there’s pretty much always been a sort of sorrow following me around, since I was very young, I was also a lot happier. Enthusiastic about everything. Scary smart-ish, and also kind of a class comedian (ah, Chemistry class!!). More importantly, optimistic about my life, ambitious, totally in love with God, extremely emotional, joyful, and a lot better at rebounding from various horrible things.
Yep, I think I want that Kat back. I think I found part of her when I lit that glow-stick last weekend. It was blue. Believe it or not, despite my general inertia which I discussed earlier, I’ve actually been working on this part quite intensively. I’m confident that when all the side-effects of my efforts fade away – which shall henceforth be referred to as ‘the plan’ – things will become sunny again.
[update added way way later whe no one will even see it: I should probably tell you that the reason I've been so fucked up recently is because a few months back I was raped again. By another professor. So that makes two. Except this time we'd been seeing each other, and I told him I didn't want to have sex that day, and he did it anyway after the meds I was taking basically knocked me out. So I guess it's date rape. Haven't really said anything about it because it's humiliating].
In honor of my theme, I went back and read the first entry I posted. Wow, is it weird! I’ve never really read it before. I know that sounds bizarre, but when I wrote it it was more like something was pouring through me than like I was creating something…If only I could blame alcohol! Ah well, you live and learn.
In many ways, this blog testifies to the fact that I’ve accomplished almost nothing of substance. I still feel adrift. I still feel like I need to learn more about this place I’m drifting to, and I still don’t know how. I still feel as though I’m caught partway between worlds, in some ways crowded about by observers and commentators while I’m not quite ready to know where I stand.
It’s been a difficult year, personally, though no darkness is completely without light. I still have great difficulty getting the words ‘please help me’ out of my mouth, which is ironic since I can be somewhat aggressive in my helping of people. I guess I have to ask myself whether I really want to be helped by someone, or whether what I really want is to be alone in it, because I’m comfortable here. Sometimes I am afraid that if I really allow myself the self-indulgence of asking someone to understand and be supporting, I’ll end up in the pieces of myself that I’ve tried so hard to hold together.
Oh well, there’s always next year.
The ‘cards’ give me cryptic advice, as I read them. In my family, I need to look carefully within people and learn to see what is good and beautiful about them (I have someone particular in mind, but that’s neither here nor there). I also need to discover my own emotions so I can connect better with people, and maybe learn to see the good in that as well. I guess you could say I should try to be more optimistic and have a sunny disposition, generally making me a happier and more playful person, basically like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy.
Thinking of money and stuff, I have to think carefully and always doubt, keeping in mind the idea that I may have made mistakes. I’m pretty sure that has nothing to do with my investments, which are pretty darn secure. What I think this is about is more like not letting the things I’ve done or decided to do before dictate my way forward simply by momentum (I have a certain warm-and-fuzzy obsession in mind here, but that’s neither here nor there). Thinking carefully and acting with more common sense is important so I don’t piss other people off. I think I need to be careful in my relationships with others and not get swept away, kind of like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy.
I also need to be careful that the things I have don’t end up bogging me down so that I’m trapped in them (again, the obsession). I need to take some initiative in terms of getting out of that. Two messages on the same thing: that’s a pretty clear sign. I do need to have some more ambition in other areas, so that I can accomplish what other people want for my life, on my behalf (I’m thinking that I need to finish my thesis, but that’s neither here nor there).
My dealings with the world and the things in it need to be more generous. Um. Maybe I’m spending too much time praying, to the neglect of everything else? But I like prayer…right now I’m quite fond of the Office of Readings. Alternately, maybe I just need to learn to cut people a little more slack (I’m thinking of someone specific, but that’s neither here nor there). Also, maybe be a little less judgmental in my dealings with church and whatnot, kind of like I was before I went so spectacularly crazy. This kind of shift should make me a better person. I think I need to work on all the ways I’m lacking.
If there is a theme, it’s that I need to return to a time when I was more fully myself, before I went so spectacularly crazy. (I went crazy after college, so it's been a while. I think in a way I like it here.) Although there’s pretty much always been a sort of sorrow following me around, since I was very young, I was also a lot happier. Enthusiastic about everything. Scary smart-ish, and also kind of a class comedian (ah, Chemistry class!!). More importantly, optimistic about my life, ambitious, totally in love with God, extremely emotional, joyful, and a lot better at rebounding from various horrible things.
Yep, I think I want that Kat back. I think I found part of her when I lit that glow-stick last weekend. It was blue. Believe it or not, despite my general inertia which I discussed earlier, I’ve actually been working on this part quite intensively. I’m confident that when all the side-effects of my efforts fade away – which shall henceforth be referred to as ‘the plan’ – things will become sunny again.
[update added way way later whe no one will even see it: I should probably tell you that the reason I've been so fucked up recently is because a few months back I was raped again. By another professor. So that makes two. Except this time we'd been seeing each other, and I told him I didn't want to have sex that day, and he did it anyway after the meds I was taking basically knocked me out. So I guess it's date rape. Haven't really said anything about it because it's humiliating].
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